Interdisciplinary Arts 0254 - Watch Your Tone

In this workshop, we will focus our attention on the function of tone in a poem as a way of communicating and deepening its emotive charge. We will examine a few of the numerous craft elements that contribute to a poem's tonal register, such as sound, detail, image, syntax, form, music, and how these tools might signal tonal shifts within a poem or complicate a poem's emotional depth. We will also consider how elements of tone create tension and counterbalance within poems. And we will draft and revise poems that engage in some serious play and think about how even playfulness or seriousness are carefully crafted things. Readings may include work by Gwendolyn Brooks, Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Hayden, Jericho Brown, Carl Phillips, Roger Reeves, Thom Gunn, and Ellen Bryant Voigt, among others. Prerequisite: At least one college-level poetry workshop.

Independent Work Writing and Research In this course, students are expected to spend at least six to eight hours a week of preparation and work outside of class time. This time includes reading, writing, research.